Sexual assault isn’t committed by just men.
Lesbians who have been raped by other lesbians are beginning to speak out, but they’re finding support slow in coming -- from the legal system, victim support lines and our own community.
When “Annie” came to, she found herself handcuffed to the bed. She didn’t scream because there was no one to hear her except for “Maureen,” still in a rage from their fight earlier that evening. Maureen then held Annie spread-eagled and raped her.
“She did what she wanted, and when she was done, she left me there, handcuffed, for about four hours while she went out,” Annie said. The memory is still fresh, although the assault occurred almost twenty years ago.
“I kept it to myself because it was an embarrassing thing: I was bigger than she was,” Annie said. “When people hear about rape, they think of a man raping a woman. It’s hard to envision one woman raping another.”
Women like Annie are beginning to tell their stories, but few lesbians have owned up to the fact that a sexual assailant may be one of our own. To many, rape is exclusively a man’s abuse of power against a woman. However, the evidence suggests otherwise.
Around the country gay and lesbian anti-violence projects record only a handful of same-sex rapes each year, mostly between men. Yet studies show that as many as a third of lesbians have been victims of sexual assault or coercion at the hands of another woman. The fact that few of those are ever reported, experts say, is painful evidence of the almost total lack of support available for women who have survived a same-sex sexual assault.
“The denial around rape isn’t about the physicality so much as the emotion,” said Sharen Shaw Johnson, director of the Los Angeles Gay and Lesbian Anti-Violence Project. “There’s a strong feeling in the lesbian community that lesbians are not violent, that they’re nurturing, more caring and incapable of rape. That simply isn’t the case.”
Defining lesbian rape is as difficult as defining lesbian sex. Although many survivors mention unwanted, even violent penetration, it is not a necessary characteristic of sexual assault between women. Rape can include the victim’s being forced to perform a sexual act on the assailant, or any form of non-consensual sex forced on one woman by another (or others). It isn’t a question of butch/femme dynamics or of size: Rape is about power.
“Date rape or acquaintance rape has the same dynamics as other circumstances,” said Kata Issari, a Seattle therapist and board member of the National Coalition Against Sexual Assault (NCASA). “One woman is more vulnerable and has less access to power, and that makes it easier for the other woman to take advantage of her.”
Kea and “Kim” had been out drinking with friends when Kim began to hassle other patrons and threaten the bouncer. Sleepy and still drunk, Kea ignored Kim’s rage as they drove home; then she went to bed alone. She awoke to find Kim in bed with her, trying to have sex. “She kept kissing me and grabbing at me, and I kept pushing her away, which was making her angry again,” Kea said. “Pretty soon I was struggling to get away in earnest, telling her ‘no’ over and over again. She had me pinned to the mattress, tearing my clothes off. As she started to rape me, I panicked, then I blacked out.”
Later, Kim apologized for raping Kea, but Kea found it difficult to accept.
“I had never heard of women doing that, so it just didn’t fit into my reality,” she said. “I rationalized it, believing I deserved it because I had been flirting with other women.”
Like domestic violence, in which it is often an element, rape is an expression of one person’s ability to exercise control over another. Among lesbians it occurs most frequently in relationships where other forms of abuse are already present. Because abuse is often already expected in the relationship, rape may be harder to identify, taking the form of violent sex, coerced sex, or sexual acts to which one partner has not consented.
“We all grow up in a society that sends messages about how we interact: Men are taught that sex is a game, that women are objects. We internalize the sexism and may play it out ourselves,” Issari said. “The majority of the time, the assailant doesn’t see what she’s done as ‘rape.’ She may say, ‘This wasn’t a comfortable, pleasurable experience for both of us.’ The effect of being sexually assaulted by a woman is a lack of safety: ‘Who can I trust now if this happened in a community where I thought I was safe?’”
Because lesbians are less likely than gay men to pick up casual sex partners, survivors most often are raped by their girlfriends. But each year anti-violence projects record a handful of date- or gang-rape incidents.
“Michelle” was in the throes of coming out in college when she answered a personal ad, hoping to find someone going through a similar experience.
“‘Becky’ came to my room, and within five minutes she started kissing me. I was already on the edge of a nervous breakdown from dealing with being gay, and I absolutely couldn’t respond,” she said. “Even though I was almost a foot taller and about sixty pounds heavier, I couldn’t do anything to stop her. She had me totally psychologically dominated. Every time she did something new, or got more intense, I thought, ‘This will be as far as it goes.’ But it wasn’t. She penetrated me, and I remember saying over and over, ‘Please don’t hurt me.’ I’d never had any kind of sexual experience and was scared to death. I think my saying something got through to her, because she finally stopped.”
For a year Michelle told no one, trying to forget the incident.
“The next summer I reread my journal, and still remembered the parts that I had erased, hoping it would go away. It hit me that what had happened was rape. I was furious as all hell. How could someone who had gone through the coming-out process do this to someone else who was dealing with the same issues? How could one woman hurt another? But I was also scared that no one would believe me.”
Often survivors keep their experiences secret, rather than risk rejection or disbelief from friends. Rape carries such clear images of male attackers that survivors may fear that accusing a fellow lesbian will be seen as disloyal or purposely destructive. One of Issari’s clients kept her story to herself because she believed the revelation would break up a close group of friends. And Annie has told only her current partner about Maureen, though Maureen died years ago.
When Michelle began to look for help, she found that school counselors and lesbian therapists were familiar only with heterosexual rape. Her situation is common: Law enforcement and social service agencies, particularly in larger cities, are beginning to train on issues related to the gay community, but there is little consistency in their contact with the gay crime victims.
Women who call mainstream rape hotlines may not be believed; police may refuse to take a report. A gay anti-violence hotline sometimes can offer only a sympathetic ear: Few lesbian therapists are familiar enough with the issue to counsel a survivor.
“The main rape crisis hotlines still haven’t learned about same-sex rape. To an extent there has been change in that same-sex rape for a man is sometimes a hate crime, and that’s accepted,” said Melissa Sargis, of the mainstream Rape Victim Advocated in Chicago. “But there’s still a stigma, especially for women.”
The situation is improving slowly. Around the country, lesbians have begun educating their peers about rape, holding workshops at anti-violence conferences and calling for training for social workers and police. Kea started a Lesbians Hurting Lesbians folder on the Gay and Lesbian Community Forum of America Online. In the spring NCASA will release for therapists a training packet on same-sex rape, co-written by Issari.
A few states, including Illinois, California and Michigan, have sex crime laws that are gender-neutral. However, New YorkState law defines rape as a man assaulting a woman, and covers-male-male rape as sodomy, although consensual same-sex sex is legal. The laws do not mention woman-woman rape.
A survivor of lesbian sexual assault can find the help she needs, though it may take perseverance and a little leg work: “First, a woman should make sure she’s OK medically,” said Nicole Hall, chair of NCASA’s Lesbian Caucus. “She should go to a hospital and identify herself as a sexual assault survivor, and bring friends if possible. From the hospital get a rape victim advocate, who will either be at the hospital itself or at a connected agency.”
Rape victim advocates are trained to listen to survivors and provide them with information about available services. They may not have experience with same-sex rape but have learned not to be judgmental, Hall said. Most states have rape crisis hotlines listed in the yellow pages under Social Services. NCASA can also refer survivors to the agency nearest them. (To reach NCASA call (717) 232-7460, or write to 912 N. Second St., Harrisburg, PA17102-3119.)
“It’s going to take some difficult soul-searching for the community to educate itself about the dynamics of rape and how it exhibits itself,” Issari said. “The effects of rape are the same, no matter the sex of the assailant. The danger is that, if we don’t confront this and deal with it, women will be hurt again and again.”
From Sept/Oct 1995 issue of Deneuve (now called Curve)